Finding positive role models neither in the Ethiopian community they have abandoned nor in the mainstream Israeli society they cannot enter, many gravitate to the fringes of society. Those special youngsters who manage to break out of the cycle of failure, generally leave their neighborhoods, rendering the community leaderless.

Back to the communities as leaders

Ya’adim seeks to address the problem. It recruits promising young Ethiopians who have finished high school and earned a matriculation certificate. Ya’adim offers them the chance to go on with their education in the Yerucham Hesder Yeshiva, and earn a teaching certificate and college degree from the Herzog Teachers College. The program is designed to encourage graduates to remain with their Ethiopian communities and apply the skills they will have learned for the betterment of their fellow Ethiopian Israelis. In the very first year of the program, participants spend one day each week working with the Ethiopian residents of Netivot, another development town not far from Yerucham.

Social integration

In addition to preparing Ya’adim students to serve their communities, the integration of young Ethiopians in the Yeshiva program has led to a very positive alliance between them and the other Yeshiva students. We are beginning now to see some of the results of this alliance, as a number of our veteran Israeli graduates have decided to make their homes in areas with a large Ethiopian population. By doing so, they may have begun a true revolution in terms of social integration in development towns in general, and among Ethiopian immigrants in particular